Alex Massie - Let capitalism succeed where CIA and nine presidents have failed

SO FAREWELL and good riddance, Fidel Castro. Only sentimental fools will miss you. The image of a small, plucky island nation holding out against the might of the United States has an obvious appeal. But life is not all an Asterix and Obelix adventure.

Franklin D Roosevelt is said to have acknowledged that the Nicaraguan dictator Anastasia Somoza was a Class A "sonofabitch", but at least "he's our sonofabitch". Like his counterpart in Chile, Augusto Pinochet, Castro has enjoyed the tolerance of many who should have known better. If conservatives – on both sides of the North Atlantic – were too ready to turn a blind eye to Pinochet's crimes, left-wingers have been equally credulous with regard to Castro's Cuban dictatorship.

His regime's achievements in health and education – always cited by Castro apologists – must be set beside the reality of an island prison in which dissent has been outlawed and the jailing of political prisoners routine. Regardless of the failures and idiocies of US policy, this has been Castro's own choice. Socialism has failed Cuba, just as it failed the Soviet Union.

Like Pinochet, Castro's successes only demand honouring in the context of his larger, wider failure. A gulag filled with literate, healthy inmates is still a gulag; a dictator who inspires affection and respect (from some) is still, above all, a dictator.

Alas, Castro's retirement is unlikely to spark real change in Havana until a younger generation comes to power. The dictator's 76-year-old brother, Raul, has hinted that reforms are necessary. However, it is all but impossible to imagine him transforming Cuba for the better.

So, if change is unlikely from within, it must come from the US. But president George Bush's call yesterday for democracy in Cuba would be more convincing had his administration not done everything it could, albeit inadvertently, to keep Castro in power. The US trade embargo on the island may not have been a strategic mistake on the scale of Vietnam, but nine presidents have resisted learning from their predecessors' errors when it comes to Cuba policy.

The strategic imperative that governed Washington's attitude to Havana collapsed with the Berlin Wall. Yet anyone listening to US rhetoric could be forgiven for supposing Castro and his regime were some kind of clear and present danger. Shamefully, however, the US remains trapped in a Cold War mindset more than 17 years after the Soviet Union disintegrated.

It would be inaccurate to call Washington's attitude blinkered. No, it has been blind. You might think that 50 years of failure would be cause for a reappraisal of American attitudes to Cuba, but that's to underestimate the wilful stupidity of the House of Representatives and the US Senate.

Far from learning from experience, the US has been determined to follow bad – and counter-productive – policy decisions with worse ones. In a move that would be more remarkable if it weren't also so characteristically boneheaded, restrictions on contact with Cuba were actually tightened by the Bush administration. Consequently, Cuban exiles in the US may send only $1,200 (615) a year to their relatives on the island and are restricted to spending 14 days on Cuba in any three-year period. American citizens, of course, are not permitted to travel to Cuba from the US at all.

This, then, is a policy environment in which Senator Barack Obama can make waves with the "risky" and "bold" proposition that Cuban exiles (but not Americans – that would be going too far!) should be able to send more money to Cuba and have their travel restrictions eased. Last September, Obama argued that US policy had only made Cubans "more dependent on the Castro regime… and isolated them from the transformative message carried there by Cuban-Americans".

This statement of the obvious is what passes for the audacity of hope in Washington.

Still, Obama's attitude towards Havana is visionary compared with anything offered by his rival for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination. When Obama floated his cautious suggestion that US policy had been a series of strategic blunders, Hillary Clinton immediately reassured voters that they need not expect anything as dangerous as a new idea or fresh approach from her administration. The status quo suited Mrs Clinton fine.

"Until it is clear what type of policies might come with a new (Cuban] government," she said, "we cannot talk about changes in the US policies toward Cuba."

Clinton, of course, was pandering to the most feverish elements in the Cuban-American community in South Florida. At first glance, this seemed somewhat unnecessary, given that most Cuban exiles tend to vote Republican, not Democratic. But last autumn – when Cuba briefly surfaced as a campaign issue – Mrs Clinton was looking beyond the primary campaign to the general election. Mindful that every vote might be needed in the key battleground state of Florida, she did not want to prejudice her prospects by being seen as "soft on Castro".

The Cuba spat was part of a wider foreign policy debate, however. Obama has hinted that, subject to certain conditions being met, he would be open to talking to foreign leaders the US finds disagreeable.

The Clinton campaign calls that naivet and suggests Obama's willingness to countenance engagement with Venezuela, Cuba or Iran demonstrates his inexperience. Better, in other words, to stick with old, failed policies than risk anything as dangerous as a new approach.

The refusal to relax the trade embargo is also perplexing, given US attitudes to other disreputable regimes around the world. Washington trusts that integration into the world economy will – eventually – undermine the Communist regime in Beijing and prompt economic and – again, eventually – political reform. Common sense might dictate that what may be true of China could also apply to Cuba.

Regime change in Cuba may be needed, but that's only half the matter. A change in attitude in Washington is just as important. Rather than wait for Raul Castro, Washington would be sensible to lift all trade and travel restrictions on Cuba.

The CIA might not have been able to kill Castro, but capitalism and contact with the US will surely sweep away the failed remnants of Castroism.